Vol. 12, Special Issue 10 (2023)

Author(s):
R Swamy, R Jayaprakash, M Sridhar, S Naveen Kumar and RVT Balazzii Naaiik

Abstract:
Turmeric is an important commercial spice crop grown in India since ancient times and named as “Indian saffron”. In India turmeric was grown in an area of 2, 96,181 ha with a production of 11,78,750 tonnes during the year 2019-20. Telangana state ranks first in area and production of turmeric. In Telangana turmeric crop was grown in an area of 55,444 ha with a production of 3,86,596 tonnes during the year 2019-20 (www.indianspices.com). In Telangana state, the farmers are following conventional method of sowing for the turmeric crop which is tidy, time consuming and laborious process. The performance evaluation of tractor drawn 4-row turmeric seed drill was done to provide required technical information to the farmers. During the field evaluation, it was observed that the field capacity of the 4-row turmeric seed drill was 0.189 ha h^-1 at an average speed of 1.259 kmph with the field efficiency of 83.72 percent. The seed rate was observed as 1543 kg ha^-1 for 4-row turmeric seed drill. The fuel consumption was recorded as 5 l/h. The yield (dry rhizomes) was recorded as 0.82 kg m^-2. The performance of 4-row turmeric seed drill has shown reasonable results for sowing of turmeric.